For her Monday, May 8th appearance on Dancing With the Stars, Fifth Harmony’s Normani Kordei used the trauma of being cyberbullied with vicious, racist attacks to motivate her emotional performance. The 20-year-old singer opened up about her experience in footage from her rehearsals with pro partner Val Chmerkovskiy.

Kordei detailed a moment in her life when she felt “helpless and desperate,” recalling the brutal backlash after a recent interview she gave had been taken out of context. “People were calling me the N word,” she revealed in a conversation with Chmerkovskiy. “It was really ugly.”

During a confessional interview, Kordei dug deeper into the type of abuse she suffered online, noting that racially motivated hate led to photoshopped images of her being “whipped, beaten and hung.”

“I shouldn’t want to change the color of my skin or texture of my hair or the fact that I’m a woman,” the pop star concluded, describing the loneliness she endured during the ordeal.

The “Work from Home” singer and Chmerkovskiy received a perfect score from the judges for the contemporary dance piece was set to “Freedom” by Anthony Hamilton and Elayna Boynton. Fifth Harmony, meanwhile, has yet to announce their plans for new music following the less-than-amicable departure of member Camila Cabello.